Considering just how important the Black Lives Matter movement is right now, and how everyone seems to finally be realizing how unfairly black people and POC have been treated for generations, it seems like the perfect time to analyze how black TV characters have been treated over the years as well!
Let's get into the characters that deserved so much better!
And while it's well overdue, we are so glad to see the world coming together to demand justice.
So, what better time to look back on some black TV characters who deserved better?!
While Winston was possibly the most hilarious member of the New Girl squad, there's no doubt that the writers had a hard time settling on who his character actually was.
For the greater part of the show, he seemed to have the most inconsistent personality — especially in comparison to the rest of his roommates, whose identities were set in stone.
Can somebody please explain to me why Susie Carmichael was the least relevant character in Rugrats? There's no good reason she wasn't as important as any of the rest of them.
I, for one, think she should have gotten her own spin-off.
Tara's entire shtick in the True Blood series was being this angry, edgy girl from a broken home. But then as soon as her life seemed to be turning arond, they killed her off.
WHY?!
Of all the characters on The Office, it always surprised me that Stanley got so little attention considering how funny he was!
Furthermore, the writers seemed to center a lot of the race-themed jokes around him, just because he's black...? I feel like they could have done better.
Okay, this one is obvious.
Mercedes had, by far, the strongest singing voice on the show and she was a strong, compassionate, driven character. But yet, she was hardly given the recognition and treatment that she deserved!
The entire time Liberty was apart of Degrassi, they made her character out to be someone who others found to be bizarre and annoying.
But hello? She was wicked smart, thoughtful, and a good friend!
Okay, they killed off Wells in like, episode four? Even though he was the son of a character that would go on to be a vital member of the cast?
I just didn't understand why they even bothered introducing him to us, letting us get attached to his charm, and then ruthlessly killing him off.
When Maggie was introduced to the show as Meredith's half-sister, and Richard and Ellis' daughter, I immediately assumed she was going to have a major, groundbreaking role on the show.
But she ended up being just another doctor — another side-story.
Skills was a BTS friend of Nathan and Lucas. But seeing as he delivered some of the funniest lines in the entire show, and had an incredibly likable personality, you'd think he would have played a bigger role!
He deserved to have a more significant part in the series, no doubt.
TBH, Riverdale is a whole dumpster fire of a show — and please do not @ me about that. It was a whole mess.
But the way they brought in Toni, made us think for a minute that she was going to have an important role, and then made her primary purpose being Cheryl's girlfriend really threw me off.
Not only was Angela written-off of the show (even though she was a main member of the BMW friend group), but Trina McGee, the actress who played Angela, later came out and detailed some of the racism she faced on-set.
It was bad enough that Charlie was virtually the only black person in the entire series. But to portray her as someone who would date two guys in the same friend group and then bounce, even though she is clearly an intellectual?
The writers definitely could have done better.
It has been years since that fateful episode, and I have still not emotionally recovered.
She was by far a more interesting and more likable character than Piper, and they wrote her off in the most heartbreaking way possible. While the scene was obviously a nod toward the black lives matter movement, the white guard appeared to be remoresful and sympathetic after the fact which is not very realistic.
